Your Ecological Address (YEA) — System Specification

@techreport{hamilton2026your, author = {Hamilton, Michael P., Ph.D.}, title = {Your Ecological Address (YEA) — System Specification}, institution = {Canemah Nature Laboratory}, year = {2026}, number = {CNL-TN-2026-025}, month = {february}, url = {https://canemah.org/archive/document.php?id=CNL-TN-2026-025}, abstract = {Your Ecological Address (YEA) is a single-page web application that transforms geographic coordinates into comprehensive ecological profiles by querying 17 or more geospatial and biodiversity APIs in parallel. Given any latitude and longitude on Earth, the system returns a structured ecological identity spanning terrain morphometry, climate classification, multi-decadal climate history, soil thermal regimes and water balance, ecoregion taxonomy, land cover characterization, real-time weather conditions, multi-taxon biodiversity inventories, seasonal phenology, recent avian field observations, and acoustic bird detections. The tool integrates data sources ranging from sub-meter terrain models [1] to 85-year reanalysis climate records [17,18,19,20] and citizen science platforms with hundreds of millions of observations [2,3], unified through a card-based progressive-disclosure interface designed for accessibility. A key architectural principle is silo independence: each data card owns its own API sources, and cross-silo ecological interpretation is delegated to a narrative LLM layer. A MySQL caching layer with source-appropriate time-to-live values manages API rate limits while preserving temporal fidelity. YEA serves as a standalone ecological reference tool, a metadata engine for the SCOPE panoramic photograph database, and a prototype component of the Macroscope integrated environmental observatory platform. This specification documents the complete system architecture, all API endpoints and data contracts, the frontend card system, database schema, caching strategy, and development conventions sufficient for independent reimplementation.} }